Chapter 10: More Questions Than Answers
It was another boring potions class for Gryffindor and Slytherin first years. Feliciano, being the excellent cook he was, was one of the best students in the class. Of course, whenever he was asked a question he'd give a silly answer. That made Snape wonder how the hell he got "E"or "O" on all of his assignments. Then again, there was a lot of shocking things about the Italian.
Like how he read his whole Defense Against the Dark Arts book and would read Dante's "The Divine Comedy" in that class. Or how he even got into Gryffindor in the first place. The Slytherins loved teasing the Gryffindors about the cowardly Italian being in their house. The other Gryffindors, save his three fellow nations, pointedly avoided him because they didn't want to be associated with a coward. They thought he tarnished everything their house stood for.
But back to potions. Today was one of those days where Snape was in a bad mood. Rumor was Umbridge had inspected him during his fifth year class earlier that day. Snape was at least thankful that Alfred Jones and Feliciano Vargas weren't in that class.
"Can anyone tell me in what situation you would need to use a shrinking solution?" he asked dully. Feliciano raised his hand.
"Ve~ Profesore, when you've made pasta for Alfred, Matthew, Yao, Kiku, Ivan, Arthur, Francis, Antonio, fratello, Luddy, Gilbert, Mr. Rodreich, and Miss Elizabeta, but only Luddy and Kiku show up because they don't want to hurt your feelings. So you pour some on the pasta so you don't waste ingredienti." Italy said causing several people to laugh.
"Mr. Vargas, do you think my class is a joke?" Snape growled.
"No signore." he replied seriously. He even opened his eyes to show how sincere he was.
"Five points from Gryffindor. Next time Mr. Vargas, I expect you to give an appropriate answer."
Alfred stood up. "You wanted an answer and he gave you one. If he wasn't taking your damn class seriously, he wouldn't turn in his work. He do everything half ass."
"Detention Mr. Jones and another five points from Gryffindor."
Matthew grabbed Alfred's sleeve and pulled him back down before he got himself into more trouble. Arthur was already pissed and he was looking for another nation to take his anger out on. America huffed and crossed his arms, muttering under his breath.
That day was also one of those days when the normally laid back nation was in a sour mood. He already had detention with Snape, but on top of that, McGonagall told him he had to go to Umbridge's detention. He had a fit that probably caused a minor earthquake in Lima, Ohio but she was relentless. He'd been pissed since and was really asking for either Nantucket to be pulled or Texas to be taken away.
Canada shot his brother a warning look before gesturing to his own curl and demonstrating a pulling motion. America narrowed his eyes, wearing a look that said "You wouldn't dare." The northern twin had gotten good at reading his brother in the past couple hundred years
Matthew leaned over and whispered, "Try me."
Had it been Mexico, she would have shot America in the knee, told him that was a warning shot, and him warned to change his attitude. Canada on the other hand, would pull his cowlick. He normally didn't bring out his hockey stick when it came to his siblings, unless it was necessary.
Nearby, Ludwig was scolding Feliciano for giving such a ridiculous answer. The little Italian looked on the verge of tears because not only did he get in trouble, but now Germany was mad. He started blubbering in Italian and begging for forgiveness. The German quickly forgave and told him to settle down in order to avoid the eventual scene Italy would cause if he was left to cry.
After what seemed like forever, the class was dismissed. Italy dashed off somewhere, leaving Germany behind. America stormed off, not bothering to tell anybody where he was going. Canada and Germany exchanged a look before heading off in separate directions. Italy would find Germany and America would literally hunt down Canada later.
Feliciano headed out to the lake to work on his painting since he was forbidden from doing it in the library anymore. Madam Pince had flipped out when she saw the pastels near her precious books. Which was all fine by Italy. He wasn't exactly neat when he set up his painting space. He also had a tendency to discard the brush and use his fingers instead, to get that perfect texture.
He set his paper out and stuck a piece of cardboard underneath to prevent his other pages from getting ruined. He started sketching out what he wanted to do, unaware of a certain group of Slytherins near him until it was too late.
Malfoy snatched the book away from him. He flipped through, acting disinterested, but was actually fascinated that somebody could draw and paint like that.
"I've seen better drawings done by trolls." he sneered.
"Ve~ give back you-a bully." Feli cried while trying to take it back. But Malfoy held it out of his reach.
The pale boy smirked and muttered something to himself. He exchanged a look with his friends before tossing all of Italy's hard work into the lake.
"There. If you want it so bad, go get it, you filthy, little Mudblood." he said before walking away.
"DOITSU!" Italy wailed, shaking with anger and sorrow. "ALL MY WORK FOR THE PAST MONTH-A! IT'S ALL GONE!"
"What the bloody hell is going on here?" England demanded as he approached his fellow nation. "First I'm told they're going to figure it out, then that frog writes me to say that bloody Mexican woman wants to know where Alfred and Matthew are, and now this? Why the hell are you crying?"
Italy just pointed at the floating sketch book. Arthur sighed and pulled out his wand.
"Accio." he murmured.
The soaking wet book flew into his hand. He murmured the spell for drying things. Once the moisture was gone, he flipped through the stiff pages to see all the paint was smudged and some of the pencil was missing. The Italian bawled harder when he saw this.
"Reparo." England said but nothing happened. "What the- Don't worry, Feliciano, we'll get you a new one. You can start from scratch."
"You mean-a it, Inghliterra?" Italy asked.
"Of course." Arthur assured him. "But it's 'Arthur' here."
"Ve~ sí."
The two headed back up to the castle, Italy still mourning the loss of his artwork. England figured the spell didn't work on Italy's sketch book because the art was infused with a nation's magic and culture. Things like that were hard for wizarding spells to repair or copy. Oh well. In a week or two, the Italian will forget all about it.
"Where are they?" Mexico demanded, her gun pointed at France's temple.
"Ask Scotland. He is ze one who sent ze letter to Angleterre." he replied. "I was upset about 'im taking mon petite Matthieu."
She pulled out her cell phone. It was time to involve her Uncle Romano. Surely he's want to know where his brother was. She'd have better luck getting information out of Scotland if Romano's colorful language and the Italian mafia were involved.
"Who the hell is this?" he growled on the other end.
"Holá Tío Romano." she greeted.
"You're one of the Tomato Bastard's colonies. What the hell do you want?"
"I need help. And if you want tu hermano, then you'll help me." she told him.
"I'm listening." he grumbled.
"Do you by any chance know where Scotland lives?" she asked.
"Sí."
"Meet me at la casa de Francia and I'll tell you more."
Matthew drug Kumajirou behind him as they made their way to the edge of the Forbidden Forest. He knew exactly where Alfred would be sulking. The polar bear was protesting and saying it was hungry.
"I'll feed you after we get Alfred, Kumacoco." he told the bear, forgetting his name. It was payback for all those times Kumajirou forgot who Canada was.
"Who?" Kuma asked.
"My brother."
"Who are you?"
Canada sighed. "I'm Matthew, the one who feeds you."
"Then who's 'Canada?'" the bear asked.
Matthew really wanted to slam his head against a tree. Of all places to remember his country name.
"Me." he replied so softly that only Kuma could hear.
"Oh."
Had anyone been around, they would give the duo strange looks. Then again, only America, France, and Mexico remembered him when he was not around and they'd be the only ones who know to look for Canada. The only reason he was even noticed was because of England's magic and even then he was still forgotten. Once this was all said and done, Canada would go back to being invisible.
Finally, they came upon his brother. The superpower was humming a familiar tune as he wrote, except this time it wasn't the American national anthem.
"What are you humming? It sounds familiar, eh." Canada said.
Most people would've jumped at a person appearing out of thin air, but not America. He was used to his brother's quietness.
"Just an old song." he replied before continuing with his letter. "I'm writing to Kiku. There's a meeting coming up and he's in charge since he's the least likely to start a fight. Anything going on in Canada that the rest of the world needs to know about?"
"Non." he replied. "Did you ask Arthur, Feli, and Ludwig."
"No. Scottie's filling in for Iggy, Gilbert's filling in for Ludwig, and Romano's filling in for Feli. So they don't need to relay messages through Kiku." Alfred replied. "Iggy's pissed because Francypants told him Mexi's lookin' for us. Knowing her, she only noticed because she went to wake me up."
"Then thank God you weren't there, eh." Canada said while sitting down next to his brother. "You would've pulled out your gun and shot her. Well, shot at her."
America laughed. "Dude, she's the one who holds her gun to my head and tells me to wake the fuck up."
Canada pulled Kumajirou into his arms and started laughing. Mexico and America usually ended up drawing guns and shooting at each other. That's why Germany didn't let them near each other at meetings. Of course they always had each other's back, along with Canada's.
"You two are about as bad as Francis and Arthur, if not worse." Matthew noted. "The only difference is you two don't have unresolved sexual tension like they do."
"Of course not dude! She's my big sister. That would be weird on so many levels." America declared.
"That doesn't stop Belarus from stalking and trying to force Russia to marry her." Canada pointed out.
America just rolled his eyes and went back to working on his letter. He was also going to write a letter to Feliks to decide when they were going to get revenge on Umbridge.
"Al, are you okay?" Matthew asked.
"Course I am Mattie. Why would you think that?" America replied.
"Alfred, you can't pull wool over my eyes. I'm your twin brother. I know you better than anyone else in the world does." he paused for a minute before continuing. "But I suppose asking you if you're alright or not isn't worth it because of your hero complex."
"I do not have a hero complex!" the American protested. "I just simply am a hero."
The Canadian rolled his eyes. "Whatever you say, eh."
"Say Hermione, doesn't that look like that Ivan guy that came into history of magic?" Harry asked when Hermione showed him and Ron the photograph.
"Blimey, that looks like an older version of that Alfred kid. They even have the same initials. No way that's a coincidence." Ron added.
"It is rather strange. Perhaps it could be ancestors of theirs." she replied.
"Well, they seem awful chummy in that photo. That Ivan bloke and Alfred don't seem to get along too well." Ron pointed out. "So I doubt they're the ones in that photograph."
"Well, if we're right about nations, their relationships might change throughout history. America and Russia were on relatively good terms before Communism." she countered.
"Well what else is in that book?" Harry asked.
"I don't know. I haven't looked for anymore pictures yet." she answered.
She started flipping through it. There were several notes from various settlers. Finally she found another black and white picture. It was a group of three people and was not in as bad of a condition as the Alaskan one was. Written on the back was "L.B., K.H., and F.V., the Axis Powers. 1938, Rome, Italy."
The first man was a serious looking Japanese man. His uniform was neat and his dark hair was flat. The next man was a buff looking German man with his light hair slicked back. There wasn't a wrinkle in his uniform. The last man was an Italian man holding a cat. His medium hair was relatively neat, with only a curl sticking out and his eyes were closed. He wore a permanent smile on his face and was the only one looking happy. His uniform was not as neat as his companions' with his tie untied and his jacket thrown on the ground.
"Bloody hell, that's those two first years. Ludwig Beilschmidt and Feliciano Vargas, right?" Ron asked.
"But what's a World War II picture doing in an Imperialism book?" Harry asked.
"Dunno, but it's them. I'm sure of it." Ron replied.
A long chapter to make up for all my short ones. These are minor plot things that'll lead into major events later. Also America/Canada brotherly bonding. They're one of my favorite brothers. Anyway, my friend and I were talking again and she gave me more ideas. I don't own Hetalia or Harry Potter. Please tell me if you see any mistakes. Thank you to my followers and reviewers. It means so much to me to have your support.